The Earth Insists on Being Beautiful

MICHAEL PAUL THE EARTH INSISTS ON BEING BEAUTIFUL March 5 - April 16, 2022

MICHAEL PAUL

Michael Paul was born in 1956 in Helena, Montana. He received his BFA from Minnesota State University Moorhead, and holds a BA in Art History and Mathematics from Concordia College. He studied painting conservation at the National Gallery in Washington, DC. After serving in the Air Force as a Geodetic Surveyor, Paul began painting professionally and established Flathead Studio in 1996. Paul is best known for his paintings of the Northern Great Plains as well as his use of traditional encaustic materials. He is a recipient of a grant from the North Dakota Humanities Council, and his paintings are included in numerous public collections including the North Dakota Museum of Art, the Plains Art Museum, the University of Minnesota, and the Center for Western Studies. He resides and maintains a studio in Sioux Falls, South Dakota.

ARTIST STATEMENT The title of my show reflects the times we live in. While we are dealing with huge turn-your-hair-white problems on a global scale and yet, The Earth Insists on Being Beautiful.

When my artist quest began, I drew. Then I painted and created sculptures and furniture and other things, but drawing always remained. Along the way I learned about metalpoint drawing, a type of drawing achieved with a stylus fitted with bits of silver, gold, copper, or other soft metals.

Prior to the early sixteenth century draftspeople made marks with these crude instruments on paper or panels prepared with a gritty gesso. The gesso abrades the metal and leaves small particles embedded in the surface. The particles of metal form a fine, faint line. Many, many lines create form and values. After working and reworking, the drawing surface becomes burnished and mirror-like and very interesting. Some metals, like silver, continue to change over time and form a tarnished patina. Then graphite was discovered around 1520 in Cumbria, England, and was quickly adopted in favor of the more cumbersome metalpoint process, leaving it to fade into the background of history.

In this group of drawings I have used silver, gold, graphite, carbon, and in one instance steel wool. The papers are made of cotton rag from the Rives and Fabriano paper mills in France and Italy. The images are from South Dakota, the Red River Valley, and Northern Minnesota lakes like Vermillion, Kabetogama, Superior, and Island Lake.

I hope you find them quiet and beautiful, and you enjoy the viewing. I enjoyed making them.

- Michael Paul

Island in the Forest 2020 | silver on paper $900.00 image: 11 x 8" | frame: 19 x 15.5"

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Boulders Gather 2020 | silver on paper $1,800.00 image: 9 x 19.5" | frame: 19 x 27.75"

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Listening to the Ice Dance 2022 | graphite on paper $900.00 image: 12 x 8" | frame: 20.5 x 16.25"

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Guardian of the St. Croix 2018 | graphite on paper $1,400.00 image: 9.5 x 15.5" | frame: 17 x 23"

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Loons Singing a Quiet Song 2021 | silver on paper $1,800.00 image: 10.5 x 19" | frame: 20 x 27.5"

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Long Before There Were Wars 2021 | silver on paper $1,400.00 image: 11 x 15" | frame: 19 x 22.5"

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All the Light We Cannot See 2019 | silver on paper $600.00 image: 10 x 8" | frame: 17.75 x 15.5"

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Leviathan 2021 | graphite on paper $1,600.00 image: 12 x 15" | frame: 20.5 x 28"

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Plowed Field 2018 | graphite and charcoal on paper $900.00 image: 9 x 19" | frame: 17.5 x 27.5"

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Three Farms, Red River Valley 2019 | silver on paper $1,400.00 image: 8 x 19.25" | frame: 16.5 x 27.25"

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It Was a Dakota Kind of Summer 2021 | silver and graphite on paper $600.00 image: 7.5 x 8.5" | frame: 14.75 x 15.5"

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Pink Cloud 2021 | gold on paper $600.00 image: 8 x 10.5" | frame: 15 x 17"

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The Smell of Rain on a Dusty Summer Day 2020 | silver and graphite on paper $900.00 image: 6 x 19" | frame: 16 x 27.25"

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Big Frida 2021 | silver on paper $2,200.00 image: 22 x 15" | frame: 30.75 x 23.25"

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Drifting Cloud 2019 | silver, graphite, steel wool on paper $600.00 image: 9 x 19.5" | frame: 16 .25 x 16.6"

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All the Church Bells Were Broken 2020 | silver on paper $600.00 image: 9.75 x 7.25" | frame: 17 x 14.25"

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She is Sometimes There 2020 | silver on paper $1,800.00 image: 12 x 18.5" | frame: 20.5 x 27"

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Outside Shadows Bulged 2019 | silver on paper $1,400.00 image: 11 x 16" | frame: 20 x 24.5"

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The Moon Paled and Held Its' Breath 2021| graphite on paper $600.00 image: 10 x 10" | frame: 17 x 17.5"

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Tony's Tin Shop and the Myra Brothel, Butte, MT 2019 | graphite on paper $1,600.00 image: 13.5 x 15.25" | frame: 22 x 23.5"

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To purchase artwork please contact: info@grovelandgallery.com or 612-377-7800

25 Groveland Terrace, Minneapolis, MN 55403 | www.grovelandgallery.com